Crackdown

Just who is Alex Mercer? The protagonist of Radical Entetainment’s Prototype, is as mysterious as he is powerful. Here is a guy who wakes up with the ability to destroy small armies yet he doesn’t know who he is. As a military target, he’s like vapor. As video game hero, he can be just as elusive.

Sometimes I think he’s like the Agent in Crackdown but my mind changes as he mercilessly pounds a soldier into raw meat. At times, he reminds me of Superman with the agility to leap tall buildings but then he changes forms like the X-men villain Mystique.

It’s obvious there’s a backstory there so I asked executive producer Tim Bennison about how the team came up with the character. It didn’t take long to answer, and Bennison pointed to three influences I wasn’t expecting.